Will The Anti – Christ Be Homosexual?

Daniel 11:37 – Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers, nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all. What does that verse mean, precisely, especially the fascinating “nor the desire of women” part of it? Some people take it to mean that the anti – Christ, or more accurately the beast, will be homosexual. Of course, this interpretation is almost certainly false, a conclusion motivated by hatred of homosexuals (rather than the true biblical stance of loving the sinner while hating the sin). This is another example of the same type of nonsense that many on the Christian right engage in when they do things like claim that the anti – Christ will be a leader of the UN or EU or represent whatever group that they oppose for worldly reasons. I am absolutely certain that at one time some of these people were convinced that the anti – Christ would be a civil rights leader, for instance. (This should not be interpreted as a defense of the Christian LEFT, by the way, most of whom do not believe in the anti – Christ or anything else in the Bible for that matter.) That is one of the biggest problems with the church giving itself over to worldliness; it causes ever so much false doctrine because it causes people to interpret the Bible through their own temporal passions than by the true revealer of all knowledge, the eternal Ruach Hakadosh. So, I am absolutely certain that right after the Massachussetts Supreme Court committed their little judicial activism adventure, a bunch of preachers were so provoked into rage by the fact that (gasp!) sinners SIN and support others in their sins that they began to interpret Daniel 11:37 through their flesh and not by the Holy Spirit. Look, the Bible has never had any problem calling homosexuality plainly what it is, and even where it is “indirectly described” (i.e. in Paul’s letters), it leaves nothing to the imagination regarding the type of conduct that it is describing. So, if the beast was going to be homosexual, Daniel 11:37 would have come right out and said it. Further, even if the beast IS going to be homosexual, whoop tee doo! So what? The beast is THE MAN OF SIN, and homosexuality would just be one more. All sins are equal because all sin makes man worthy of the second death and therefore in need of the Saviour’s death to serve as substitutionary redemption. While homosexuality is clearly a PERVERSION, in terms of sin itself, the only ones that God pays special attention to are 1) murdering the innocent, 2) oppressing the poor, and 3) blasphemy against the Holy Spirit (which can be done any number of ways, including being a false teacher). So, I would be willing to propose the notion that in addition to killing a lot of innocent people, oppressing many poor people with his brutal economic system, and blaspheming with his false religious system, the man of sin is also going to be a mighty big gossip! Yes, that is right, gossip is a sin! But you aren’t going to see that many preachers going around saying that you will know the anti – Christ because he is going to be this big gossip, because that would offend all of the gossipmongers in their congregations! And you aren’t going to hear the “religious right” sort talking about how the anti – Christ is going to oppress the poor, because so many of them support or get behind political candidates that support very harsh economic, social, and criminal justice policies against the poor and would rather see $100 billion given away to our big corporations in tax breaks and subsidies that “create jobs” than $1 million “wasted on ‘nation building’ in the ‘Third World'” (as if the term “Third World” or anything like it exists in the Bible). And you also aren’t going to hear them say that the anti – Christ will come as a Jesus Only Oneness Pentecostal Word of Faith predestination “you can’t lose your salvation and you aren’t saved unless you speak in tongues” teacher, either, because even though they KNOW that those doctrines aren’t biblical, they, er, go to conferences and stuff with guys like that and bring in a lot of money. Except, of course, if they’re Catholic. Oh, they have NO PROBLEM entertaining “the anti – Christ will be the pope” notions, because WE ALL KNOW that the Catholic deviations from the Bible are FAR WORSE than our own, right?

Instead of reading that fragment in Daniel 11 out of context because of the worldly cultural notions of today, let us consider it in this fashion: that the beast will be SO DEPRAVED IN HIS EVIL THAT HE WILL NOT EVEN DESIRE WOMEN! Why? Because his desire to please himself through power will be so strong that it will DESTROY HIS NATURAL AFFECTION! Now again, none of this Catholic bashing about the celibate priesthood fulfilling Daniel 11:7. Catholic Priests have desire for women but ABSTAIN FROM FULFILLING IT as a sacrifice to God. (Of course, anyone who has read the Bible for five minutes knows that it is a sacrifice that God never asked for and does not want, but facts are facts.) But this fellow’s evil will be so great that his natural desire for women is nonexistent.

And as such, instead of reading into Daniel 11:37 something that is not there because of your frustration with the current political situation and the success of the “gay rights movement”, consider something that IS there instead: an affirmation of the natural desire between a man and a woman that is meant to be fulfilled in the holy union of man and wife. In the Garden of Eden, God said that it was not good for man to be alone, and therefore He made woman in the image of God as man’s equal to be his companion. And inherent in man was a very strong, and very natural, desire for the companionship of matrimony. It was man that took what was created to be the pure and holy product of God’s love given freely to man and turned it into something painful, hurtful, and dirty. It first happened in the Garden of Eden, when after the fall of man Adam became so depraved through sin that he tried to blame Eve (and God also) for his actions. We later saw it when man created the institutions of polygamy, sex chattel slavery, and prostitution, and then went even further into homosexuality and bestiality. And then came along religion, which has filled so many men and women with such fear and loathing of their bodies and of sex that even men and women who have been married for years have problems in that area that in many cases lead to adultery and divorce. Wow, Mr. Preacher, it is far easier for you to get up on your pulpit on Sunday or on your radio and TV show and claim that the anti – Christ will be a homosexual Catholic pope than it is for you to talk about the sexual problems that the married people in your own congregation are having, isn’t it? You don’t have the guts to stand up and say that a lot of the married members of your congregation, including the people in high administrative offices and the ones who give a lot of money to the church, need to come to you for counseling and spiritual deliverance on the problems that they are having in their marriage, and to warn them about any generational and inheritance demon issues that might also afflict their children and harm THEIR marriages by keeping THEM from developing healthy mutually enjoyable and beneficial sex lives with their spouses? Or, Mr. Preacher, is your church one of the ones where Internet pornography has been the best thing to come along in a long time, and the fantasy life that it has trapped many of your congregants in gives them yet another way to keep them from dealing with the problem? Why do so many of your congregants have computers (and TVs with DVD players and TiVos) IN THEIR BEDROOMS to begin with, Mr. Pastor? And by the way, Mr. Pastor, why do YOU have them in YOURS?

Well, no one is willing to get up in front of their congregations and talk about things like that. Is it because they lack guts? No. It is because they lack a love for God and for God’s people, and because of that they take the easy road, the easy way out, to go through the wide gate. Which is why they point the finger at homosexuals and at Catholics. It is easier to preach on Daniel 11:37 THAT way than it is to have all the men in your congregation stand up and ask them A) how many of you still desire your wives, B) how many of you ONLY desire your wives, C) of those who fail B) how to deal with that lust that is in your heart and D) of those of you that fail A) how you can RESTORE YOUR NATURAL AFFECTION THAT PLEASES GOD and E) those of who actually pass A) and B) – which will be few – how to fulfill that desire WHILE FULFILLING THAT OF YOUR WIFE TOO!

All right you religious right political megachurch preachers who like to get up and “prophesy”, tell me when is the next time you are going to give a sermon like THAT.

22 Responses to “Will The Anti – Christ Be Homosexual?”

Paul S.said

I’m impressed how one takes the very best of christianity, compares it to the very worst of non christianity, and concludes this is evidence that christianity is best.

What would happen if one took the equally valid opposit stance and compared the crusades and witch-hunts and murders and ignorance of chriostianity, and compared that to the development of science under the moors, the development of social welfare under muslims in iraq, the development of science by jews, and the development of philosophy by atheists, and concluded the exact opposite?

Or will you say “those weren’t real christians”. Thats okay. Then the ones who did otherwise weren’t “real” muslims or “real” atheists ….. everyone escapes blame.

You need to think hard and take responsibility. Suppose your blog post was honest and talked about how * christians * [as well as others] did these things. How christians supported “the institutions of polygamy, sex chattel slavery, and prostitution” at times too.

Sir, with all due respect, you completely misunderstood everything about the post to which you commented, and did so to the point where had you not actually quoted some of the post in your comment, I would have believed that your comment was aimed at the general nature of my weblog rather than at any general post.

Now sir, in general terms, the reason for the existence of this weblog is not to promote Christianity or to attack other religions. Instead, the reason for this weblog is to promote God, the God of the Christian Bible, which is the one true God, and I aim to do this by causing those who do not worship the true God to start doing so exclusively, and by encouraging those who already worship the true God to do a better job of understanding the Bible that God left for us so that they can and will keep His Commandments. So while it may be perfectly true about what great things Muslims did in the year 800 and awful things Christians did in the year 1200, that is ultimately irrelevant to my goal, which is trying to get people who are living NOW to care about what is going to happen to them when they die. I about telling people how bringing things that have nothing to do with God and nothing to do with what He told us to do in the Bible into the church and into our “religion” (for lack of a better term, I prefer to use the term “personal relationship with and worship of God”) causes nothing but trouble.

I have no problem with Mormons, Muslims, Jews, atheists, Buddhists, or what have you. My only issue regarding them is that they will spend an eternity in the lake of fire unless they accept Yeshua HaMashiach (Jesus Christ) as their Lord, their God, and their Saviour, and for that reason I am doing everything that I can to get them to accept Yeshua HaMashiach so that they can be spared that fate. And that is precisely the same issue that I have with people who say that they are Christians but are not. You say that Yeshua HaMashiach taught humility? Well let me tell you what He also taught: “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” John 14:6. Know what that means? It means that the only way to get to Heaven is through accepting Yeshua HaMashiach as your personal Saviour from your sins, and accepting Him as Your God and one with the One True God. Now tell me sir: since you obviously do not believe that this is true (for if you did, you would have understood my post), then why on earth do you have any regard for what “Jesus” (as you called Him) taught regarding humility or anything else, and believe that I should? Because if Yeshua HaMashiach is ANYTHING ELSE BUT the resurrected Son of God who also is God, then there is absolutely no reason to care anything about anything that He said. Quite the contrary, He and His followers were nothing but frauds, liars, and dupes who are responsible for the deaths of countless millions of innocent people, and the misleading of many billions more. Right? Do you know how many people were burned at the stake, tossed to the lions, and otherwise brutally killed by the Romans because they believed that Yeshua HaMashiach was the resurrected son of God? Now, if the story wasn’t true, what would that make Yeshua HaMashiach, “Jesus”, for claiming that He was so if He was not? What would that have made His disciples for claiming that it was so if in truth they had merely helped Yeshua HaMashiach (along with His wife and child I guess) escape to France somewhere, or just went and stole and hid His body (or lied about where He was buried in the first place) and thereby caused all of these people to die over a lie? Very bad people, right? And say Yeshua HaMashiach WAS the Son of God, but the exclusivity claims are false: that “Christianity” is not the only path but that there are “many paths to Heaven”, and “universalism” is true after all; that so long as you are “a good person” (by whose standards?) and don’t break too many of the commandments (whose commandments?) too often, then you are fine. OK, so why did Yeshua HaMashiach claim otherwise in John 14:6 and pretty much everywhere else in the gospels? Wouldn’t that make him – gasp! – a liar and a deceiver and a very bad person? Except, well, He wasn’t just a person … He was God too. Wouldn’t that make Him a very bad God, one unworthy of being trusted, followed, and worshipped? OK then, maybe you believe that what “Jesus” truly said was altered by the church as part of some conspiracy (which is what someone who believes in space aliens came on here yesterday claiming) and has been lost to history. All right, if that is the case, then what is the truth? Is there even a certain truth? I would say no, that there isn’t, because for everything to be true, then nothing is. (Hey, how’s that evolution/Big Bang theory going? You know, the Muslims that you came on here to defend in from a post that did not mention Muslims in any way, shape or form don’t believe that either by the way, and for that matter neither do the Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, or any other theistic religion.)

Paul S.said

You’re right. There is no reason to believe. Any verifiable claim that can be made for one claimed divine person, can be made for others.

So if people dying for Jesus is proof of anything, then what should one make of jews, muslims, atheists and others who died equally believing in and choosing death rather than revoke their beliefs? Either dying for ones beliefs proves something, or proves nothing. To me, it proves they believed. It doesn’t evidence any resolution whether they were right.

Likewise we have that Jesus believed certain things. At least, we think we have that – there is, you must grant, a historical possibility the texts were written and edited by people whose motives were what we might today call “spin”. It wouldn’t exactly be without precedent for people’s belief to overrule their honesty just slightly. But either way, that is all we have. Muhammed, and many other people who were or have been represented as divine, also believed the same. Because Jesus said he was divine, his followers say he was, and his texts say the same, this logically means he was? Then what are we to make of muhammed, his followers, their texts, or any one of a hundred others?

The problem is, the argument is essentially circular. Jesus is divine because his texts and followers say so, which are believed because the culture is built on them and says so, and really, that’s all there is. If you were in other cultures, you’d notice that the claims made by Jesus and jhis followers are no more evidenced than any other. Muhammed says believe this and your sins will be forgiven. Judaism says that you dont have to believe to be forgiven. And quite simply, each of these, within the limits of its texts, and its believers and founders, seems very plausible to its mostly rational and sincere followers. Obviously most are wrong, and obviously one conclusion that is very clear is, one can believe and believe… and simply be mistaken. One can have had martyrs and people who died for their faith, and be mistaken. One can have holy books and saintly founders, who may have claimed divinity, and evidently some of these saintly people were mistaken.

Well it comes to this. Either the Bible is 100% true, or 100% a lie. If the Bible is 100% a lie, then there is no reason for this website to exist at all, and instead of coming on here urging me to “respect other faiths”, you should be doing the Richard Dawkins thing and urging me to take down my website altogether, and morever doing whatever you can regarding getting the FCC, the Justice Department, and whoever else to ban this site and all like it. Why? Because Christianity is not 100% true, then it is utterly dangerous and destructive and should not be tolerated to any degree, in any form, or in any context. But then, the onus would be on YOU to prove that Christianity is in any way untrue. See the state of the world today? If you and people like you are holding your cards, then it is past time to lay them on the table!

He’s right Paul, if you think it’s a lie then as a presumably moral person you should be doing everything in your power to prevent the spread of such a henious fabrication(like Richard Dawkins seems to be doing).

At the same time however you must realize that you would also be acting out on the basis of a belief.

You are so right. Even the belief that there is no God is an unprovable belief requiring faith itself. And you know what? RICHARD DAWKINS ADMITS AS SUCH IN HIS OWN BOOK, that believing in atheism and evolution require leaps of faith, which he chooses to call “creative reasoning”, and then he claims that Christians are guilty of some sort of intellecutal (and moral) failing for rejecting HIS BELIEFS! How ironic that in his own book, Richard Dawkins admits that he is no different than us!

Paul S.said

It is customary in debate, to address others’ points rather than just repeating ones own. The points I have made are kind of obvious ones, and not repetitions of other authors. If people have willingly died for many incompatible beliefs, then dying for a belief (even in large numbers) is clearly not evidence that the belief died for was accurate. So the post I added above is looking at the logic by which claims are supported.

That’s important before we look at competing or different claims. To try and decide which religion is accurate, or “prove” one, by 1st grade logic, will surely not be anything like close to honest integrity. So before we look at who defends what by what arguments, can I suggest we look with a calm head at the arguments used themselves, because many of them are unhelpful and do not in fact provide anything more than emotional comfort – no actual support at all. To claim “people died for this religion” or “this book says it” may be very reassuring, but it may also prove zero. That is not a specific point of christianity. It’s a point about any argument that a belief is likely to be right because people died for it, or because a book says so.

Can we therefore consider my points re-made, and this time round, actually consider them rather than sidelining into richard or 100%’s or what one might assume I do or don’t believe. The latter we can come back to, but they are of limitede value in addressing whether the arguments made in favor of a christian interpretation are borne out.

Paul, I don’t believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead because people have died in His Name. I don’t believe a Buddhist monk’s worldview just because he sets himself on fire in protest.

I will point out that the 11 men (save for one, John) who followed Him during His ministry (that’s excluding the Apostle Paul) testify that Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead. Could they be lying? Sure, you can believe that if you so choose. You can believe that it profited these 11 men (later 12 with the addition of Matthias) to make up this story that their dead Rabbi rose from the dead. It’s called the “meal ticket theory”.

Let’s assume that this theory is true and these 11 dudes made the Resurrection stuff up(we’ll set aside Saul’s conversion). 10 of them died martyr’s deaths proclaiming that Jesus was the Son of God and that He died and on the 3rd day He rose again. Does that validate the Resurrection? Of course not but it does call into question the sanity of men who make up such a heinous lie and knowingly die for that same lie. Don’t you agree?

The suicide bomber comparison is lame because none of these happy fellows claim to have seen Mohammed receive Gabriel’s revelation.

Personally, I believe that Jesus Christ was God in the flesh, He died and on the 3rd day He rose again. Did this belief come naturally? Of course not. After the Fall, our natural inclination has been one of rebellion against God, which I spent doing for the first 25 years of my life until my conversion in 2003.

Funny thing happened on my way to hell, Paul. My sister it turns out had just been baptized (age 23) and told me about this Jesus guy. I flippantly dismissed it as fairy tale nonsense and to prove my mettle I picked up a Bible to point out to her (a very new follower) the contradictions found within her precious Scriptures.

The more I read the more I started to see the truth therein. I came to a point where God (through the Holy Spirit) showed me that repentance was needed and that Jesus Christ died to reconciliate us to Him. He granted me sight to see that He is God and I am not, this is how I lived my life, for me and me alone. He granted me sight that I may see that He is good and that He sent His Son to take the punishment that is, because of our sin, ours. These are spiritual things of which I speak of and they fall on deaf ears if one is dogmatically assured of nothing but the material world.

Paul I believe in Jesus Christ because He made Himself known to me through the Holy Spirit who He grants to those who truly follow after Him.

You continue to artfully dodge my challenge to you, which is simply that if you believe Christianity to be untrue, then you are being completely intellectually dishonest and morally bankrupt by not opposing it. So, why are not you doing the morally, intellectually correct thing by opposing Christianity for the betterment of the world? Telling Christians to “be respectful” and “be tolerant” isn’t going to work, because quite frankly they aren’t going to be. You aren’t going to get someone who believes that God healed him when he called on the name of Jesus to “tolerate” another religion. You aren’t going to get a Christian who believes that she had a “vision” of a specific event that later came true precisely according to her vision to “respect” another religion. That person is going to continue to believe that only Christians are going to Heaven and everyone who rejects Jesus is going to hell, because the Bible of the same God that he or she believes healed or provided a vision of that person says so. So, if these things are untrue, and are mere stories or delusions, they are never going to change. It is always going to be the source of irresolvable social conflict on a global scale with dire consequences, and the only moral and intellectually honest thing to do is to make a principled stand against the belief system.

How do I know this Paul? Because you are talking to one. I was a lifetime sufferer of asthma, Paul. It had gotten so bad that I could not walk across my front lawn (which isn’t big at all) without triggering an asthma attack. I was also physically, emotionally, and psychologically addicted to the medicine that was “treating” my asthma, except that because of my overuse of it, it was virtually ineffective at stopping or preventing attacks. Even worse, my asthma medicine was destroying my kidneys! But one day I cried out to God and he healed my asthma and my kidneys. And it wasn’t a gradual thing, either. I went from gasping for breath and having a physical/psychological/emotional need for that steroid/chemical mixture that was destroying my lungs and kidneys and that I could not go two hours without needing a puff to at least LIMIT (if not stop) my wheezing and other symptoms one minute to tossing my inhalers (I had two kinds) in the trash and never using them since. And that is just ONE supernatural occurrence that has happened to me and my family! So no Paul, you are not ever going to get one such as me to be “responsible” by tolerating and respecting other religions, because to me the responsible thing to do is to tell everyone that they had better worship the God that healed me, or else they will spend an eternity in the lake of fire. So even though you may not agree with me Paul, cannot you see things from my point of view, and understand why I will never stop doing what I do?

Paul S.said

Well, lets slow down, and try logic not rhetoric… again. I’ll take the main points one at a time.

Laz:
It is far from unknown for a significant size group of people to believe something that is in fact, possibly untrue. Bleeding statues, the ride of Muhhamed to heaven, and quite a few psychological experiments attest to it. So I stand back and say, the fact that 11 or 12 people say they saw a person after his death, is not (unsupported) much evidence. Again, we don’t have to choose between truth and complete malice. Thats a straw man argument. Mistake, wishful thinking, conspiracy to defraud (not unknown) and well known and academically respected human/group psychology could all form the basis of quite reasonable explanations and all occur quite commonly now and in history. Without disrespect, more people than that number, claim fervently to have seen Elvis walking round after his death. If they lie, then others may have done so too.

So again, people (single or groups) may believe something, and die for it, and this doesn’t actually much evidence its truth. It only evidences their belief it was. I thought I had made that clear.

I also didn’t mention suicide bombers, so we’ll skip the claim I referenced something that I didn’t.

The rest of your post I can respect. It says basically, “I came to feel it was true”, without leaning on dubious rhetoric or flawed logic to persuade via fallacies. It’s honest and truthful, I suspect – that’s how it was for you. And that is how it would be for people who “came to see” or “felt” that God had shown them Ludaism or Islam were true also. Same kind of description if you read such pages. But nobody can deny that is how spiritual realisation seems to occur.

The problem is that if one accepts that you believing it was a Christian vision you felt, was due to God, one must ask why less credence should be given to someone who claims with equal basis a different vision. The same logic that supports yours, supports their experience. The same logic that denies their interpretation and what it said to them, means yours could be mistaken too. You have a logical problem there, it isn’t proof, it’s simply your experience and your interpretation. It may be true, but honestly, it equally may simply be “persuasive to you” for reasons in your life and mind.

Healtheland:
I’m interested in this stage at finding out what basis there is to such claims. The logic which supports them and if it’s strong or weak. I don’t mind people believing what they believe, but using shoddy logic (if the case) to persuade others to agree, is not appropriate. So I’m exploring the basis upon which you feel others should believe as you do. So far it’s not very impressive. They should believe it because others died believing it. But that’s true for christian and non christian beliefs alike, so it means little as evidence. They should believe it because witnesses say so. But witnesses have (singly and in groups) supported things which you would say that wasn’t proof of too. And so on. That’s where it’s at. If there is no strong basis then that’s my answer.

Now, as to your other points, I have no argument. To be crude (no disrespect intended) if my niece refuses to step on cracks in a pavement one day, and that day she gets a prize in the post, or my dog sniffs a bin art random and finds food in it, they’ll repeat that and follow it, perhaps as a ritual, perhaps long term. Its how we operate.

If you prefer a logical view, suppose the odds on a person having a sudden psychological change that spontaneously fixes their asthma, is a tiny tiny number. One ina million, one in a hundred million. And yes, asthma can at times be psychologically moderated, real asthma with real symptoms. So… now look at how many things can be changed suddenly in a person’s life that way. Anger suddenly vanished? Inner peace over a loss? An exam that was bound to fail? A kid almost run over by a car? Cancer? 1-in-1000 survival odds of survery? Many many things would be felt as “miracles” if they happen. A million things, ten million. And there are 6 billion people on the planet. Logically even if the odds on a specific thing are very very tiny, one of the many millions of such things will happen to many people in the world. It’s inevitable. Thats not religion, that’s basis statistics #101, inevitability, and the fallacy of the Sally Clark case (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor%27s_fallacy ). A very unlikely thing happened to you. Does that mean God? No. Because out of 6 billion people that same unlikely thing is statistically likely to happen to some… this proves nothing of the cause, but a lot about how intuition of statistics can mislead. Your choice to interpret that as God is simply… how you interpret an event in your life.

And yes I do understand. To take your last point. As with Laz above, that at least is honest. It speaks of you, and your choices for yourself, and I believe is spoken with integrity.

Paul S.said

>> Now, as to your other points, I have no argument with the fact that something happened in your life that seems exceptional as you describe it. But I think there is a very human tendency to see “significance” where actually, there isn’t – a form of fallacy well known in law and statistics. To be crude (no disrespect intended) if my niece refuses to step on cracks in a pavement one day, and that day she gets a prize in the post, or my dog sniffs a bin art random and finds food in it, they’ll repeat that and follow it, perhaps as a ritual, perhaps long term. Its how we operate. Biologically, I mean. We know there isn’t logical connection but we *feel* there is some mystical significance anyhow. Its how we’re wired to work. It’s good evidence that how we feel about an event, and our tendency to label unlikely events with supernatural or mystical significance, can mislead us.”

>> If you prefer a logical view, suppose the odds on a person having a sudden psychological change that spontaneously fixes their asthma, is a tiny tiny number. … [cont]

Hmmmsaid

Stop trying to use logic to understand the things of God because we will never be able to fully understand Him because He says our thoughts are far from His…He also said that it takes faith to please him so if without faith you will never please God…He is too great to be understood by your mere mind so if u cannot look in faith then all there is to do is pray for u otherwise u r doomed

It is far from unknown for a significant size group of people to believe something that is in fact, possibly untrue.

No argument there Paul. Again it seems strange to me that a group of 11 men would conspire to make something up and hold on to that lie (fully knowing it to be a fabrication) throughout their life and not only that but to die because of that same lie. Maybe you have encountered such lunacy, I have not but I’m not yet 30.

Without disrespect, more people than that number, claim fervently to have seen Elvis walking round after his death. If they lie, then others may have done so too.

That’s fine and dandy (you can also throw in people who have had close encounters of the 3rd kind) ,but I have never heard of anyone undergoing a most unpleasant execution for claims such as these.

If all of a sudden people who have claimed to have seen Elvis were rounded up and sentenced to death if they didn’t ‘recant’. I would think that the majority if not all of them would renounce their ‘sighting experience’ to save their skins.

Jesus’ Apostles didn’t recant, the 11 who died martyr’s deaths (John didn’t die a martyr’s death, though he did spend some time on the penal colony at Patmos) didn’t recant what they knew to be true.

You know Paul, what’s funny about the Gospel accounts is that the 11 didn’t even believe Jesus had resurrected. They thought He was a ghost and it scared them stiff.

I know you didn’t mention suicide bombers but it’s a common rebuttal to what I stated above so I thought I’d preempt. My apologies.

The rest of your post I can respect. It says basically, “I came to feel it was true”, without leaning on dubious rhetoric or flawed logic to persuade via fallacies.

No actually you didn’t really understand what I’m saying. I didn’t come to feel the claims of Jesus Christ as true. I was first, a witness to the change in the lives of my sister, my girlfriend (now my wife), and my mom. I cannot tell you how many times my mother asked me to accompany to her church. I was pretty condescending and thought her infatuation with religion as a consequence of her not having an education. She didn’t press as hard as my sister did after her conversion. I related what happened in my previous post so I won’t rehash. His Word Paul, terribly convicting and sharper than any double-edged sword. Not a feeling at all, His Spirit Paul, teaching His Word, speaking through His Word. The Trinity at work, me praying to the Father, the Son next to me, and the Holy Spirit in intercession for a wayward child.

Feelings? No, I don’t think so. It wasn’t pretty for before coming to Christ we must be broken by realizing our bankruptcy in the face of such a Being. Like I said before, these are spiritual matters and they will not make much sense if one is dogmatically assured that nothing but the material exists.

True worshipers will worship God in Spirit and Truth. While converts to other faiths might have real spiritual and joyous experiences, there is no Truth in those experiences. On the flip side one can learn theology and cite Scripture after Scripture and even intellectually assent to some theory about Jesus Christ,but without Spirit all you have is a head full of knowledge and not a changed life.

Please forgive the regression but I saw that you mentioned Jesus in your first comment. Paul, who do you say Jesus is?

Mikesaid

TO be honest I think you are stark raving bonkers. Religion seems to me to be a mass hysteria of some kind that human animals suffer from. The hysteria grows as things in the world appear to mount up or when religeous freedoms are curtailed or agued against. If you are so sure of your faith and you are so sure you are going to live forever why do you have to keep on and on about homosexuals taking over the world (do you actually know any homosexuals? I think you will find that they are not marked with 666 or are evil and wicked in any way (anymore than heterosexuals – all the worlds genocide dictators were heterosexual). I believe that religion and religeous institutions and human bible and koran interpretations are the real evil. Moreover, this evil done with good intent is to disguise the evil being done by religeous people. The basic problem faced by humans is their inate ability (all of us) to have the potential of absolute wickedness. Early civilised man needed to prescribe a code of morality to try to law down ground rules that if we all adopted humanity would at least be humane. To ensure compliance they invented a stick and carrot (heaven and hell) that could not be proven but so tempting or fightening that non-compliance might be really awful. Humans are also inately lost where there is a lack of routine and reaffirmation (praying, going to church regularly) hence reminders to comply. Then along come homosexuals who have clearly been around since humanity began in exactly the same numbers (5 to 15% of the population) and as it was heterosexual men who wrote the bible and have a in-built dislike of homosexuality, homosexuals get the thumbs down forever. This is the real evil. To scourn innocent,loving, respectful honourable humans who just happen to prefer the same sex is an abomination. God created homosexulas – possibly to give religeous people something that they have to think deeply about (i.e. Why did God create homosexuals?) not so that each of them should grow up being hurt hated and marginalised and even murdered. Maybe we are there to reduce the endless and fatal over-population or to look after elderly relatives or to demonstrate to warring males that it is possible to truely love another man, who knows? To be honest there are many more questions about many things that we have no answer to. I think there are far more important issues about liffe on earth that need to be addressed before you start moralising over love between people of the same sex. Who dont you talk more about poverty and sarvation, racsism, war, the reason for the myriad gods and religious belief or perhaps even try studying human psychology and philosophy to find out why you are too frightened to accept that we are here and then we die. Tht’s it!. I am gay and apart from being attacked all my life and trying to live a life without fear (my partner for 33 years recently attacked and lost his sight! (not by a religeous person but by someone who believed too strongly in the anti-gay religeous message). As was said to me when I came out to my parents: “do what you wish with your life even if I do not approve but dont ram it down my throat!” I think you would learn from this message also.

Donnasaid

Yes the Anti-Christ will be a homosexual. The Word of God is being fulfilled today when Jesus said the land in the last days just before His return to take His people out of the world would be full of homosexuals, which is an abomination to Almighty God. Any person that is a lesbian, homosexual, transgender, bi-sexual is full of demons; their actions, thought process’, are fueled by the devil. The Anti-Christ will fit very well into this community until Satan doublecrosses all those who are inhabited by demons, the homosexuals, witches, satanist, new age, the athiets, the humanist, the Catholics, along with all idolators and false religions. Do not be deceived, what the world calls great progress for the homosexual is a horrible lie right out of hell. Satan is preparing his last efforts to get all into hell that he can. Jesus who is God Almighty took on a body of flesh so that He could put to death sin in the flesh of this fallen world. Do you know that God created a world where the people did not listen to Satan’s lies and now Satan has no access to that world. Jesus paid your way into heaven: His blood will cleanse you clean: and Satan knows the blood is powerful and Satan has to give up the helpless captives to the blood of Calvary. Jesus loves you and Satan hates you. Time is FAST running out: REPENT or you will go to hell for all of eternity.

David L. Williamssaid

ETERNITY!! We use that word often but seldom consider its meaning. Frankly, it is beyond human concept. But maybe we can make a parable to make it more understandable:

Let’s say there is a three foot diameter hard steel ball on a pedestal. Once a year, a dove flies by it and brushes it with one wing. By the times that steel ball is worn away to nothing, not even the first morning of eternity will have passed. DavWms

The basic problem faced by humans is their inate ability (all of us) to have the potential of absolute wickedness.

God was actually shielding man fom knowing more then he should when he commanded them to not of the fruit of the tree. This knowledge of good and evil is absolute good, or absolute evil, there is no gray area.
The same knowledge man has to use a hammer to build, and to do good, can be taken and used for killing. The same applies to a car for driving or hit and run. The tongue can be used to praise or to curse.
And yes sex. Intended for man to reproduce is now used wickedly by those who reject God’s word.

You said;

God created homosexulas – possibly to give religeous people something that they have to think deeply about (i.e. Why did God create homosexuals?) not so that each of them should grow up being hurt hated and marginalised and even murdered.

God created man and woman. He can never makes something flawed. The flaw came into being when man fell and his eyes were opened. Before that man walked in the way of the Father. It was at this moment satan moved to distort what God created. It is unatrual for a man to enjoy placing the reproductive organ God has given him in the sewer system of another man. God made woman for this organ, and a way to reproduce. To use it in any other way is a distortion of God’s intention for man and is therefore sin. Anything that distorts Gods true intention is deception and is of satan. And many there be that follow the deception into hell.

You said:

I think there are far more important issues about liffe on earth that need to be addressed before you start moralising over love between people of the same sex.

It is this sin that God calls an abomination. His word tells us it is because of this sin He will cast us out of the land.
So you see Mike. It is those who believe it is okay to do this sin that are causing all of us pain. God is not a respecter of person and because they are allowed to do in the land, judgement will fall on us also, because we also live in the land.
God will allow the seas to roar and drown the land just like we’re seeing today. He will allow strangers to come in and possess the land. This is what happened to Israel, and is happening to us today. From south of the border and from strange lands they bring their false religions (Islam). The buy up 7 elevens and soon will tell us what to do, and how to worship.
Japan and China own large portions of America and are buying up more each day.
Islam has said it will have America someday and we are the only ones standing in their way.
Do you understand that you are forsaking the very ones who are reaching out their hand to you saying “brother, there is a better way. Come to Jesus and he will take away the desire.” You are actually siding with a religious system that will behead gay men and women. Do we do this?
Sir, Sharia law is nothing to play with, yet you are willing to forsake your Christian hertiage, calling us hateful because we warn you.
If things continue going the way they are, you will come face to face with the following:

ISLAM

Islam commands that homosexuals must be executed.

In February 1998, the Taliban, who once ruled in Afghanistan, ordered a stone wall to be pushed over three men convicted of sodomy. Their lives were to be spared if they survived for 30 minutes and were still alive when the stones were removed.

In its 1991 Constitution, in Articles 108—113, Iran adopted the punishment of execution for sodomy.

In April 2005, a Kuwaiti cleric says homosexuals should be thrown off a mountain or stoned to death.

On April 7, 2005, it was reported that Saudi Arabia sentenced more than 100 men to prison or flogging for ‘gay conduct.’

These homosexuals were lucky. Early Islam would have executed them, as these hadith demonstrate.

Ibn Abbas, Muhammad’s cousin and highly reliable transmitter of hadith, reports the following about early Islam and Muhammad’s punishment of homosexuals: . . .

‘If you find anyone doing as Lot’s people did, kill the one who does it, and the one to whom it is done’ (Abu Dawud no. 4447).

This hadith passage says that homosexuals should be burned alive or have wall pushed on them:

Though this punishment of a wall being toppled on them is extreme, the Taliban were merely following the origins of their religion.

So you see sir, we are very loving of you even when you sin against God, but we must warn everyone of sin, not of just this sin but all sin, telling all men we are all sinners, and if they will except Jesus, His blood will blot out this sin and others, and they will be with the Father!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You can judge for yourself who seems more loving.

angiesaid

I see it like this: The anti-Christ will participate in every unholy and perverse thing in existance and contrary to the word of God. The anti-Christ is in your political system, your churches, your homes,and entertainment. Also consider Lucifer’s fall in Isa.14 chapter and Jesus parables about the wheat and the tares.

Jasonsaid

Much respect to you man, always standing up for our Father’s Word. May His Spirit continue to guide you now and forever.
Grace be with you.

To: Reverend Williams

You are so right, we as followers of Christ are trying to warn people of their sin, but they continue to spit in our faces; nevertheless, we will keep reaching out. I don’t think people fully grasp the tyrannic reality of Sharia Law, and if they continue to neglect, and Islam takes America or the world over, they will be in for a very rude awakening, one with death written all over it.